


Working White Collar

by NyeLung



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV), White Collar
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Imagine Style, Timeline What Timeline, some violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-26
Updated: 2018-04-26
Packaged: 2019-04-28 08:24:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14445270
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NyeLung/pseuds/NyeLung
Summary: So, you remember that time when Erin Strauss asked Hotch to step down, maybe transfer to White Collar Crimes and how he was ready to do it and just didn't end up there because Garcia kept blocking his letter? Yeah, well, what if he had gone to White Collar? What then? What if he had ended up in the unit of Peter Burke?





	Working White Collar

**Author's Note:**

> So, this is just some thinkpiece/imagine kind of thing about Hotch and White Collar and if anyone wants to write it as a full story, that person's got my blessing. Just hit me up, maybe link this story etc. Cause I wanna read that.

### Intro

So, you remember that time when Erin Strauss asked Hotch to step down, maybe transfer to White Collar Crimes and how he was ready to do it and just didn't end up there because Garcia kept blocking his letter? Yeah, well, what if he had gone to White Collar? What then? What if he had ended up in the unit of Peter Burke?

Aaron would say that White Collar crimes are far more pleasant than the continuous abysses of human madness. He's good at his job, was very good with serial killers and maybe he's missing it but he tells himself that he's doing good now, catching frauds, people who speculate with hard earned money and lose it in the millions without losing themselves. At the end of the day, what he does, is still important.  
White Collar doesn't save his marriage, though. Long hours sitting over mortgage fraud papers or even longer hours in the surveillance van. Being called in at midnight because they cracked a detail in their newest case or not coming home at all because he has to go undercover in New York's illustrious night-life – Haley does like New York, though, so she stays in the area with Jack and he appreciates that.

Peter Burke would say that Aaron Hotchner is an asset. He's hard working, an eye for details and maybe their best man for the darker cases. Sometimes, though, Hotchner looks at things from the serial killers perspective – and he's good at that, frighteningly good – and seems to forget that they are White Collar, not BAU. Sometimes Peter is sure that Hotchner misses his older, darker work.  
Peter notices how the divorce shakes Hotchner up and he wonders how he would cope if El would leave him (- he wouldn't cope very well, he knows that, admits that to himself and then stays silent). He gives Hotchner the free space he needs and hopes that it's enough. He makes sure that he's got enough work to take his mind off of things and enough free weekends to see his son.

Clinton Jones would say that Aaron Hotchner is a good man, sometimes very serious, very stern and he's glad that his unit chief is Burke – he'd heard that Hotchner had been a unit chief at the BAU and is very glad that he's not been working with him then. He would say that Hotchner is a great shot, maybe their best but he couldn't compete with him yet, so it's not been decided.  
Clinton is there when Hotchner signs the divorce papers and he sees something break in the man. He keeps his mouth shut and waits but Hotchner continues working as ever, so he just watches and waits.

Diana Barrigan would say that Aaron Hotchner is a hard man. Hard worker, hard on himself and hard on others. She knows his kind of eyes and although she might not be a profiler as Hotchner is, she knows that he has been beaten as a kid and she knows that there are cases he still carries with him. Sometimes she can see him take notes and then Hotchner would work even harder on the case they are working as though he had just cracked something for himself and it gave him the motivation for their more … civilised work.  
She also knows that Hotchner has been married twice. To his wife Haley and to his work at the BAU. He keeps working like that with them. Long hours in the Bureau and sometimes even longer hours in the van. Maybe he's not married to White Collar but it's a close call. He's married to work, maybe and so she's not surprised when it makes the rounds that Hotchner is divorced now.

And that's when Neal Caffrey breaks out of prison.


End file.
